Political Odds: Macron, Le Pen Duel For French Presidency
As the first-round of the French election drew nearer, the polls began to tighten around the top four candidates. But in the end, the two leading won out and now we’re headed for a second-round run-off election between Emmanuel Macron (En Marche!) and Marine Le Pen (National Front) on May 7th.
Macron garnered the most votes with 23.9% and Le Pen trailed closely behind with 21.4%. Now, the two candidates have just two weeks to sell themselves to the remaining 55 percent of voters who didn’t pick either as their first choice.
After the first round results were announced, the leaders of both major parties, Francois Fillon (The Republicans) and Benoit Hamon (Socialist Party), immediately announced their support for Macron. This was hardly unexpected. When Marine Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie Le Pen (National Front), made it through to the second round in the 2002 election, the other candidates threw their backing behind his opponent. The National Front ended up getting crushed in the second round, collecting only 17.8% of the overall vote.
For this reason, pundits and bookmakers alike do not favor Le Pen’s chances. The pollsters are in agreement; in a head-to-head, polls suggest a strong win for Macron.
Many believe that Le Pen has already reached her ceiling, and that anyone who would even consider voting for her, already has. Her platform is centered around an anti-immigration, anti-globalization stance that’s seen as too extreme, too polarizing, and too unorthodox to possibly be successful.
Now where have we heard that before?
In light of Brexit and Trump, I think it’s a little arrogant to write her off so quickly. For starters, Marine is not her father. While Jean-Marie Le Pen’s supporters were almost exclusively older men, Marine Le Pen has managed to gain support from female voters and is considerably more popular among the younger crowd. Her softer, gentler image has made it more socially acceptable to align with the far-right National Front.
In a refreshing turn of events, the polls were actually on point this time. Overall, they fell within a margin of one percentage point for the top four candidates. If they are to be trusted, then Macron stands an excellent chance come May 7th.
Politics tends to bring out strong opinions in people, and if you’re willing to put your money where your mouth is, here are the odds.
French Election Odds
Odds to Become the Next President of France:
Emmanuel Macron (En Marche!): 11/39
Marine Le Pen (National Front): 4/1
Other: 49/1
Odds the winning margin will be:
Less than 1%: 45/1
More than 50%: 4/1
Odds of a Frexit by year-end 2018: 9/1
Odds France is the next country to leave the EU: 10/3
Don Aguero is a man of many talents, writing about nearly anything you can put odds to. Don has been writing for SportsBettingDime since 2015, covering sports, entertainment and politics. You name it, he's covered it! He is also a steadfast West Ham fan, and has learned to embrace that suffering.
